High-School Basketball / Nonleague Boys -- Franklin Posts 71-69 Win Over Rainier Beach

Franklin stayed undefeated last night by beating Rainier Beach 71-69 in a wild nonleague boys basketball game at Franklin High School that included a dramatic seven-minute delay in the final minute.

With Franklin leading 66-64 and 31 seconds to play, a referee called a technical on Franklin's fans for throwing a bottle cap on the playing floor. The technical was rescinded when it was established that the offending student didn't attend Rainier Beach or Franklin.

The game before a near-capacity crowd had been stopped earlier in the quarter after coins had been tossed on the floor from the Franklin cheering section. Earthquake fans had been warned at that time that a technical would be called if more objects were hurled.

The game had been stopped in the second quarter when referees demanded that a female in the Rainier Beach stands surrendered a laser light she had been flashing at players.

Both Beach Coach Mike Bethea and Franklin Coach Ron Drayton agreed after the game that rescinding the last-minute technical was the proper call.

"That was the best call," Bethea said. "I don't blame the loss on that. The bottom line is we still were in position to win the game or tie it up and go into overtime with three of their best players out of the game and we didn't do it. . . . We didn't make plays or free throws down the stretch."

Drayton said, "You're darn right it's a good call. It never should have been made in the first place. A referee is just setting himself up for failure when he makes a statement that the next thing out of the stands is going to be a technical on the whole team. You can't do that when you have fans intermingled. There were Rainier Beach people over there (in the Franklin section) and Franklin people over there."

The emotional game between neighboring schools is likely to be remembered for its unusual delays, but it also featured two of the best team's in the state and some of the best players.

The leading scorer with 24 points was Beach's Jamal Crawford, who had been a question mark for the game after being told by Bethea last week to take some time off to tend to undisclosed personal matters "because his head wasn't in the game." Bethea said the situation with Crawford, last season's 3A state player of the year, "is over."

Crawford hit 8 of 21 shots from the field.

Alvin Snow, a junior, led Franklin with 21 points and Oregon State-bound Jimmie Haywood scored 19.

Franklin led 39-31 at halftime, then went on an 8-0 run to build a 47-31 lead early in the third quarter. Beach tied the game at 64-64 with 1:10 to play when Will Conroy hit a three-pointer.

Franklin got its final seven points on free throws by Snow, Chad Yarbrough, Haywood and Neil Rosenshein. Haywood contributed three of the free throws, one of them with 28 seconds left after grabbing a critical rebound after Yarbrough missed a free throw. Haywood scored two more free throws with 22 seconds left before fouling out with 6 seconds to play. Earlier, Snow and starting point guard Trevor Tsuchikawa had fouled out.

Beach almost pulled out the victory, but a three-point shot by Conroy at the buzzer missed.

The triumph kept 4A Franklin undefeated with a 4-0 record that includes impressive Saturday night wins over Davis of Yakima and O'Dea.

Beach (4-3), the reigning 3A state champion, is ranked No. 4 by The Times among 3A schools. Entering last night, Beach had lost to O'Dea and Mount Vernon of Illinois.

"People have to understand we're a young team," said Bethea. "We're coming together. Over the last 10-15 games, we're going to be a real tough team. Right now, we're struggling, but we're going to be fine."

Some fans missed the game because Franklin administrators failed to effectively publicize that tip-off had been changed to 5 p.m.

Franklin faces Decatur tomorrow at 4:45 p.m. in the first day of a three-day, eight-team Lynden tournament. Rainier Beach is off until a Jan. 5 game at home against Cleveland.